Tag Archives: Jay Leno

The old saying goes, “lead with your best foot forward”. This is equally true when you’re starting out a “new” late night show. Conan O’Brien did this in June of 2009 when he started ‘The Tonight Show’ on NBC. A sample of the guests Conan booked for his first 2 weeks looks like this(in order of appearance):

Well, despite Frump’s efforts, it looks like things have gotten even worse for our dear, dear Coco, as you can see from this LA Craigslist Casual Encounters ad. Read: Conan’s move to Fox may come sooner than expected.

As you’ve been able to tell, we’re staunch supporters of Conan O’Brien. You’ve probably also noticed we like to straddle that fine line between sports and pop culture in our articles. So it should come as no surprise that I came up with this comparison amid a conversation last night with Ciaran, a fellow frumpster. It dawned on me that Jay Leno changing his mind about retiring from late night television closely mirrors Brett Favre deciding(multiple times) he wasn’t ready to retire from the NFL.

Brett leaned towards retiring, actually retired, then came back and in doing so altered the careers of Aaron Rogers of the Packers, Chad Pennington of the Jets, and the two headed monster of Tarvaris Jackson/Sage Rosenfels of the Vikings. Jay Leno announced retirement, changed his mind and came back and is now in the process of altering the careers of Conan O’Brien, Jimmy Fallon, and the often forgotten about Carson Daly. Continue reading after the FRUMP for more on my comparison as well as funny-man Patton Oswalt’s feelings toward Jay Leno after all this mess.

It has been officially announced by NBC that Jay Leno will be removed from his primetime 10pm time slot due to his poor ratings. Unfortunately this means that Conan O’Brien(my choice in late night since 1993) is left with a difficult choice. He can move to 12:05 or move to a different network. This move would also push Jimmy Fallon’s start time back to 1:05am which is absurd(I really like his show btw). It seems NBC is *politely* trying to push Conan out so they can go back to their clean lineup with Leno on the Tonight Show.

*Update* – 12:52p.m. 01/11/10

According to the New York Post Conan is understandably peeved at NBC and is considering an offer from FOX to move his show to their network.

“This level of sh- – -iness was not expected,” one source said.
“He’s done a great job for NBC. He moved his entire staff, he moved his family to LA. And five months later, they repay him like this?”
As it stands now, the source said, “Conan would be happier somewhere else.”

Jerry Seinfeld even weighed in with his (quite PC)thoughts:

“What did the network do to Conan? I don’t think anyone’s preventing people from watching Conan,” he said during an appearance to hype his new NBC show, “The Marriage Ref.”

Let’s see NBC move Jerry’s show to midnight with the unfunny Leno as a lead-in and see what he thinks then. Who’s going to turn it back from Letterman at 12 to check out what’s on NBC? I personally think FOX could be a good fit(except they have the worst HD in television) as he would most likely have more freedom. What do yall think? Please leave your thoughts in the comment’s section, that’s what it’s there for! Before we get into what Conan *should* do, let’s take a look back at what got NBC in this mess. Check it out after the FRUMP!

*Update* – 11:00p.m. 01/12/10

Conan O’Brien has released a full statement. This is probably the best written statement I have ever read. It’s so ridiculously good i can’t get past it. If Leno doesn’t pack it up and retire after this, then neither he nor NBC have any soul whatsoever. Be a man Jay, WALK AWAY!!!